


Baggage

by palimpsessed



Category: Carry On Series - Rainbow Rowell, Simon Snow & Related Fandoms
Genre: Gen, Simon's Watford Duffel, Trauma, baggage, wayward son
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-08
Updated: 2021-03-08
Packaged: 2021-03-15 00:33:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 480
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29925204
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/palimpsessed/pseuds/palimpsessed
Summary: A little meta on literal and metaphorical baggage in Wayward Son.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 16





	Baggage

**Author's Note:**

> From this tumblr [post](https://palimpsessed.tumblr.com/post/644210378279092224/since-were-being-emo-about-ws-id-like-to-talk).

Since we’re being emo about WS, I’d like to talk about Simon’s Watford duffel. After ditching everything at Carhenge and casting Amazing Grace, Penny gets her phone back, Baz gets most of his clothes and most importantly his mother’s scarf, but Simon doesn’t get anything. That always made me sad because he has so little and most of it was probably with him. And Simon never comments on this. He doesn’t mourn the loss of his belongings, he mourns the loss of the classic Mustang. Does Simon not get his things because he didn’t have magic to help cast the song and therefore wasn’t included in its result? Baz is very clear in that scene how it’s all about the intent, and I think both he and Penny intend to get all of their belongings back, not just their own.

I think what’s most important here is that what Simon loses is his Watford duffel. He’s had it presumably since he was 11. Now, idk if it was actually a “Watford” branded duffel, but it was the one he used there, as Baz tells us at the airport. This duffel is part of Simon’s past, his traumatic childhood as the Chosen One and the Mage’s boy soldier. And Simon is most definitely carrying around a lot of metaphorical baggage from all that trauma. He can’t really escape from it; he’s physically carrying it around, symbolized in the form of literal baggage. (Agatha’s lacrosse sweatshirt, too, which he’s carrying around on his back by wearing it, and which he also seems to lose.)

Also, speaking of the airport. Simon uses his duffel to create space between him and Baz, to pull away from him when it’s the closest they’ve been for months, because he’s self-conscious about condescending homophobes. The same way his trauma is pulling him away from Baz, because he doesn’t know how to cope with it and they won’t communicate.

I think Simon has to lose his childhood duffel on the road trip, because the whole thrust of his arc in WS is to find a way to let go of the idea of who he was and find out who he is. He can’t do that if he continues to drag the symbol of his childhood trauma’s baggage around with him. He has to be willing to leave it there and go on with his life. He will still have to live with his trauma, but he doesn’t have to let it weigh him down. (He does have wings, after all 😉.)

[bloodiedpixie’s](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bloodiedpixie/pseuds/Bloodiedpixie) [fic](https://archiveofourown.org/works/29563590) got me on this train of thought, so please go check that out if you’re okay with reading MCD. She’s doing a series of WS character studies and they’re great. Just read the tags.

And since I’m talking about metaphors for trauma, I have to give a shout out to [this amazing piece](https://theflyingpeach.tumblr.com/post/619675113203351552/hes-not-a-villain-hes-just-a-boy) by [theflyingpeach](https://archiveofourown.org/users/theflyingpeach/pseuds/theflyingpeach).


End file.
